I am not I. An imposter assumes a false or fraudulent identity. On occasion a client will tell me that he or she feels like a fraud, an imposter. The person will say I do not know myself or who I am. I am afraid I will be discovered and exposed. Someone who experiences and suffers with this anxiety is always on edge because at any moment their identity will be seen and heard by others.
The feelings of self-doubt, along with a lack of self-confidence seem to be internalized just as their real capabilities and talents are not personally identified or valued. What needs to be owned and revealed is one’s ability to be wholly and completely themselves and own who they are in their life. Generally, the client will want to emulate and be just like someone else that they compare themselves to and who is better situated than they are in life. The fear of imminent exposure causes them to protect themselves by using words such as “faking it till I make it, or I am just winging it.”
Thinking errors and irrational thoughts are often involved because the person experiences ever present negative self-talk that lives rent free in their head. These ruminations block the rational facts that support their own ability. The following poem by P. Bodi describes this inner world experience.
Feeling out of place.
Like you don’t belong.
Like others will find out,
You’ve been “faking it”
All along, but confidence is not a
Given, it is grown, keep.
Building it, step by step,
Until it is your own.
The opposite of imposter syndrome is the Dunning-Kruger Effect. This is the false belief that we know more than we do. Typically, real experts underestimate their level of expertise; while people with low ability over-estimate one’s ability. The following Aesop’s Fable describes this dynamic.
A man fell ill, and being in a very bad way, he made a vow that he would sacrifice a hundred oxen to the gods if they would grant him a return to health. Wishing to see how he would keep this vow; they caused him to recover is a short time. Now, he hadn’t an ox in the world, so he made a hundred little oxen out of tallow and offered them up on an altar, at the same time saying, “Ye gods, I call you to witness that I have discharged my vow.” The gods determined to be even with him, so they sent him a dream, in which he was bidden to go to the seashore and fetch a hundred crowns which he was to find there. Hastening in great excitement to the shore, he fell in with a band of robbers, who seized him and carried him off to sell as a slave and when they sold him, a hundred crowns was the sum he fetched. Do not promise more than you can perform.
“The fool doth think he is wise, but the wise man knows himself to be a fool.”
‒Shakespeare
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